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Description
Blue Angel (Aoi Zaizen/Skye Zaizen) from Yu-Gi-Oh! VRAINS!
Costume made and worn by me. Photo taken at Naka-Kon 2019.
Yu-Gi-Oh! is something which I recently got back into after many years away. I liked the original anime series quite a bit, but I didn’t follow through to any of the spinoffs. I also never played the TCG because my friend group and I were already heavily invested in other card games. Then, in 2018, I got addicted to the Duel Links mobile game, and that led to me checking out the current anime, VRAINS. Blue Angel’s intensely cute character design, with its heart motif and blue-and-pink color scheme, felt directly targeted at me, so it was immediately clear that I should cosplay her.
The first part of the costume that I made was the wig. It was a pretty big stretch of my skills, as the only really drastic wig styling that I had done before was for Rosalina, and I wasn’t especially happy with how that one turned out. Because I wasn’t confident that I could pull it off, I started with the wig so that I could easily bail on the project if I couldn’t make it work. Fortunately, it came out even better than I expected. The base wig is a Jaguar from Arda Wigs in Electric Blue with two matching ponytail clips and additional wefts in Electric Blue and Pistachio. I also used some blue felt, some wire for the hearts, and a ton of Mod Podge and hairspray.
In line with my reasoning for starting with the wig, the next things that I made were the wings. The core of each wing is made of eva foam, which is glued to a piece of ½" pvc pipe. I basically built a pillow around that skeleton to make the wings look soft and rounded. The piece of pipe extending from each wing connects to a t-piece, then to a vertical piece of pipe that runs down my back and attaches to a corset, distributing the weight of the wings to my waist. The details of the wings (a pink heart and purple clover on the front and an aqua wing on the back) are appliqued on.
The main fabrics that I used were polyester satin in blue (for the middle part of the skirt and the tie) and in cyan (for the bodice, the upper part of the skirt, and the tops of the stockings), peau de soie in white (for the wings, the blouse, the bottom/inside of the skirt, and the feathers) and in aqua and purple (for various details), polyester spandex in navy (for the stockings and accessories), and polyester poplin in pink (for the trim and hearts).
The blouse and bodice were a little tricky because they had to fit over the wing harness. The blouse has a velcro closure in the back with a space in the middle for the pipe to stick through, whereas the bodice has a full-length zipper and has a low enough back for the pipe to come out from the top. The navy piping on the bodice is some cotton rope that I sewed on. The tie has a layer of vinyl inside to make it thicker and keep its shape. The tie is directly sewn to the front the blouse (no part of it wraps around the collar).
The three layers of the skirt (cyan top, blue middle, and white bottom) are all connected as one piece. It has a waistband, usually covered by the bodice, with a zipper in the back. The four aqua wings are pinned on. The pink trim, which forms a heart shape in the front and a flower shape in the back, is also sewn on, though the streamers going from those shapes to the wings hang loose.
For the underskirt, I made a five-layer hoop skirt. The hoop skirt has an elastic waistband at the top, and has velcro along the outside of the bottom which I use to attach it to the bottom of the skirt, keeping the two aligned. I made each of the rings of the hoop skirt using 12-gauge wire. The feathers on the side of the skirt each have a skeleton made from lighter 18-gauge wire directly attached to the bottom rung of the hoop skirt. The feathers get bent easily when walking around in the costume, but they are just as easy to bend back into place, which I thought would be preferable to accidentally poking people with them.
I bought a pair of low-heel ankle boots to use as the base for her shoes. I ended up cutting off a large part of those boots, keeping basically the sole and just enough of the heel and toe to firmly hold my foot. I was then able to build the rest of the shoe atop that frame using various fabrics from the rest of the costume. I added a zipper to the back and a loop of wire around the opening to help the shoe keep its shape. The wings and clovers on them are stuffed with fiberfill. Finally, I painted the soles to match my pink fabric.
The stockings, choker, armlets, bracelets, and hair bows where all made using my navy polyester spandex fabric. The armlets and bracelets are not this dark in the actual design, but it was convenient to use the same fabric for them since I needed something with more stretch than my main blue fabric had. The choker and armlets have a velcro closure, but the bracelets just slip on. To accommodate that, I had to make the attached purple clovers a bit large. It’s probably worth noting that, in the anime, Blue Angel is always depicted wearing her duel disk, so you normally see only one of these clovers, but it’s clear in her concept art that both bracelets are the same. The stockings were straightforward to make because the fabrics I used had the correct stretchiness for them to stay up without me needing to add elastic. The middle of each hair bow is an acrylic gemstone that I painted, and each has an alligator clip on the back to attach to the wig.
I bought a pair of heart earrings to wear with this, but they would have been hard to see with the wig, so I left them off. Honestly, the costume had enough going on without them, so I was happy to have one less thing to deal with. Other than those and the Duel Disk, I don’t think that I omitted any details.
The cards that I used as props in some of my photos are Trickstar Holly Angel, Trickstar Lilybell, and Trickstar Lycoris.
My construction of this costume overlapped with a challenging time in my life. As a result, it took a lot longer than I had hoped, and I look back at parts of the process with frustration. Nonetheless, I’m happy for the journey, and the result far exceeded my expectations. I can’t overstate how happy I am with this costume, how proud I am of completing it, or how much fun it was to wear!

Description
Blue Angel (Aoi Zaizen/Skye Zaizen) from Yu-Gi-Oh! VRAINS!
Costume made and worn by me. Photo taken at Naka-Kon 2019.
Yu-Gi-Oh! is something which I recently got back into after many years away. I liked the original anime series quite a bit, but I didn’t follow through to any of the spinoffs. I also never played the TCG because my friend group and I were already heavily invested in other card games. Then, in 2018, I got addicted to the Duel Links mobile game, and that led to me checking out the current anime, VRAINS. Blue Angel’s intensely cute character design, with its heart motif and blue-and-pink color scheme, felt directly targeted at me, so it was immediately clear that I should cosplay her.
The first part of the costume that I made was the wig. It was a pretty big stretch of my skills, as the only really drastic wig styling that I had done before was for Rosalina, and I wasn’t especially happy with how that one turned out. Because I wasn’t confident that I could pull it off, I started with the wig so that I could easily bail on the project if I couldn’t make it work. Fortunately, it came out even better than I expected. The base wig is a Jaguar from Arda Wigs in Electric Blue with two matching ponytail clips and additional wefts in Electric Blue and Pistachio. I also used some blue felt, some wire for the hearts, and a ton of Mod Podge and hairspray.
In line with my reasoning for starting with the wig, the next things that I made were the wings. The core of each wing is made of eva foam, which is glued to a piece of ½" pvc pipe. I basically built a pillow around that skeleton to make the wings look soft and rounded. The piece of pipe extending from each wing connects to a t-piece, then to a vertical piece of pipe that runs down my back and attaches to a corset, distributing the weight of the wings to my waist. The details of the wings (a pink heart and purple clover on the front and an aqua wing on the back) are appliqued on.
The main fabrics that I used were polyester satin in blue (for the middle part of the skirt and the tie) and in cyan (for the bodice, the upper part of the skirt, and the tops of the stockings), peau de soie in white (for the wings, the blouse, the bottom/inside of the skirt, and the feathers) and in aqua and purple (for various details), polyester spandex in navy (for the stockings and accessories), and polyester poplin in pink (for the trim and hearts).
The blouse and bodice were a little tricky because they had to fit over the wing harness. The blouse has a velcro closure in the back with a space in the middle for the pipe to stick through, whereas the bodice has a full-length zipper and has a low enough back for the pipe to come out from the top. The navy piping on the bodice is some cotton rope that I sewed on. The tie has a layer of vinyl inside to make it thicker and keep its shape. The tie is directly sewn to the front the blouse (no part of it wraps around the collar).
The three layers of the skirt (cyan top, blue middle, and white bottom) are all connected as one piece. It has a waistband, usually covered by the bodice, with a zipper in the back. The four aqua wings are pinned on. The pink trim, which forms a heart shape in the front and a flower shape in the back, is also sewn on, though the streamers going from those shapes to the wings hang loose.
For the underskirt, I made a five-layer hoop skirt. The hoop skirt has an elastic waistband at the top, and has velcro along the outside of the bottom which I use to attach it to the bottom of the skirt, keeping the two aligned. I made each of the rings of the hoop skirt using 12-gauge wire. The feathers on the side of the skirt each have a skeleton made from lighter 18-gauge wire directly attached to the bottom rung of the hoop skirt. The feathers get bent easily when walking around in the costume, but they are just as easy to bend back into place, which I thought would be preferable to accidentally poking people with them.
I bought a pair of low-heel ankle boots to use as the base for her shoes. I ended up cutting off a large part of those boots, keeping basically the sole and just enough of the heel and toe to firmly hold my foot. I was then able to build the rest of the shoe atop that frame using various fabrics from the rest of the costume. I added a zipper to the back and a loop of wire around the opening to help the shoe keep its shape. The wings and clovers on them are stuffed with fiberfill. Finally, I painted the soles to match my pink fabric.
The stockings, choker, armlets, bracelets, and hair bows where all made using my navy polyester spandex fabric. The armlets and bracelets are not this dark in the actual design, but it was convenient to use the same fabric for them since I needed something with more stretch than my main blue fabric had. The choker and armlets have a velcro closure, but the bracelets just slip on. To accommodate that, I had to make the attached purple clovers a bit large. It’s probably worth noting that, in the anime, Blue Angel is always depicted wearing her duel disk, so you normally see only one of these clovers, but it’s clear in her concept art that both bracelets are the same. The stockings were straightforward to make because the fabrics I used had the correct stretchiness for them to stay up without me needing to add elastic. The middle of each hair bow is an acrylic gemstone that I painted, and each has an alligator clip on the back to attach to the wig.
I bought a pair of heart earrings to wear with this, but they would have been hard to see with the wig, so I left them off. Honestly, the costume had enough going on without them, so I was happy to have one less thing to deal with. Other than those and the Duel Disk, I don’t think that I omitted any details.
The cards that I used as props in some of my photos are Trickstar Holly Angel, Trickstar Lilybell, and Trickstar Lycoris.
My construction of this costume overlapped with a challenging time in my life. As a result, it took a lot longer than I had hoped, and I look back at parts of the process with frustration. Nonetheless, I’m happy for the journey, and the result far exceeded my expectations. I can’t overstate how happy I am with this costume, how proud I am of completing it, or how much fun it was to wear!